The 24 Hours of Daytona hadn’t yet concluded last Sunday when I found myself thinking more about the 2014 edition rather than the drama immediately unfolding in Florida.

I’ve always been a sports car junkie. In my mind, the greatest time in American racing was the domination of the Ford GT-40s at Le Mans from 1966-69. Take that Ferrari.

“Prototype” is one of my favorite racing words, although “GT” isn’t that far behind. Carroll Shelby and Dan Gurney are two of my heroes. The more exotic the sports car, the better. Porsche, Jaguar, Corvette, BMW, Audi, etc.

But I’ve struggled since 1999. That when sports car racing in America was split apart by the same type of uncivil war that almost destroyed IndyCar racing.

In one corner of the sports car battle was the NASCAR-backed Grand-Am series featuring the 24 Hours of Daytona. Opposing that organization was the American Le Mans Series founded by enthusiast Don Panoz and using much the same rules as the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

The ALMS featured a handful of technically-advanced cars and two solid races in the 12 Hours of Sebring and the Petit Le Mans as its featured events at opposite ends of the annual schedule. But the Grand-Am Series had bigger fields and NASCAR’s deep pockets in addition to the season’s biggest single sports car race.

The strength of the Grand-Am series was evident last weekend in the season-opening 24 Hours of Daytona. Great race. And a great drive by a winning team that included Juan Pablo Montoya and sports car legend Scott Pruett.

As good as that race was, however, better days are ahead. That’s because there will be a merger between Grand-Am and ALMS for the start of the 2014 season. Actually, it is a take-over. The ALMS series is being folded into the Grand-Am.

“I wish this had happened 10 years ago,” said Carlsbad’s Boris Said, who is one of the country’s most respected sports car drivers. “This merger was way overdue.

“The ALMS failed miserably. Grand-Am has a vision. The (NASCAR’s) France family going to be driving the boat and I’m glad about that. This will create an economy for sports car racing. It will become far more professional. They will also come out with a better product to entertain the fans.”

Said sees sports car racing advancing on all fronts with Jim France in control.

“I think the NASCAR model is going to be applied to sports car racing,” said Said. “Drivers are going to be promoted by the series. Fans will be able to relate to the drivers as well as the cars. You can’t have the factories run it, but they have to be involved.

“Once you link drivers to cars to the series, it’s going to take off. NASCAR knows it’s not just the cars or the driver. People want to get behind both. The fans love the cars, they can relate to them. It’s like when I watch Tiger Woods playing Torrey Pines. I’m not Tiger Woods, but I can see him play the same hole I’ve played. That’s one of the attractions of sports car racing that is going to be a focus of this new series.